


Chaos Theory

by The_Problematic_Blender



Series: What If? [4]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Canon Rewrite, Chaos Theory, Gen, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Spoilers, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-26
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2019-06-16 14:59:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15439626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Problematic_Blender/pseuds/The_Problematic_Blender
Summary: Barry Bluejeans liked to think of himself as a simple man, but when an elf he barely knows takes a hit for him in Phandalin before it's leveled to the ground, his life gets a whole lot less simple.A canon divergence fic based on one small difference: Taako dies in Phandalin instead of Barry. There are major spoilers for the entire TAZ Balance plot-line right in chapter one, I'd advise not reading this until you've finished Balance.





	1. Moonlighting

_“The only simple truth is that there is nothing simple in this complex universe. Everything relates. Everything connects.”_  
_\- Johnny Rich, The Human Script_

* * *

Lucretia takes a deep breath, calming her nerves. Killian had just left, talking about the three guys that she just brought in to be innoculated during her debriefing. This was it. She ensured their employment with Gundren, and now they were on her doorstep. They should be coming into the throne room any minute now-

As she thought that, the door opens, and she takes a deep breath and puts on a neutral facade. With a cold gaze, she looks over the three who enter. Magnus enters first, no surprise there, and just by him entering, Lucretia felt calmer. He brought a presence she hasn’t felt in far too long, a somewhat calming feeling, as ironic as that was. Merle follows in after him; he does his hair differently now, but it suits him. And trailing them from behind-

Lucretia’s heart drops to her stomach.

_Barry._

_Where was Taako?,_ Lucretia thought. _Taako was supposed to be here, why wasn’t Taako here, how was Barry here?_

Lucretia fights to keep hold of her expression as the three look around the room before their eyes fall on her. “Welcome, the three of you, to the Bureau of Balance.” She greets, surprising herself with how calm she sounds. “It’s a pleasure to have you.” Her eyes fall on Barry again and she briefly loses her train of thought; Lucretia forces herself to look at one of the others. “I’ve heard a lot of great things about your performance from Killian. Before we go any further, I’m going to need you to hand over the gauntlet so we can destroy it promptly.”

“But it’s our gauntlet.” Magnus points out.

Beside Magnus, Merle crosses his arms. “You see, that’s kind of the business we’re in. You know, we kinda get stuff and then people pay us for it. So.”

“Yeah, and our we’re kind of out for some gold because of that gauntlet.” Barry adds.

“Oh, you will be paid. You will be paid very, very handsomely.” Lucretia assures the three. She claps her hands, calling, “Davenport!” Davenport walks out, holding the silver tray with a coin bag resting on it. “Go ahead and give them their payment.”

“Right away!” Davenport remarks, making Lucretia reel. The first time in months Davenport manages to string a sentence together is the day that Barry quite literally throws the curveball of the century.

Davenport walks over to the three and offers the tray, and Magnus takes the pouch of gold from it. “And, uh,” Magnus looks to Lucretia. “excuse me, madam, what is your name?”

Lucretia’s heart jumps at the question. “That’s actually classified, but-”

“Then how should we address you?” Magnus interrupts.

“Uh. The Director is fine.”

“Uh… Director-”

“Or Madam Director is fine, also.”

“Madam- Madam Director-”

“Lady Director.” Merle chimes in.

“Shut up.” Magnus says, punching Merle in the shoulder with no real force behind it.

“Nope.” Lucretia quickly follows.

“I’m happy to destroy the gauntlet.” Magnus says. “I would like to be present while it is destroyed, so I can confirm-”

“Oh, yes, I imagine you would. It’ll be quite spectacular.”

“Can we watch while you hurl it into the fires of Mount Doom?” Merle asks, rubbing his shoulder from where Magnus made contact with him.

“If only it were so simple. It’s actually taken us quite some time to develop anything capable of destroying something quite so powerful.” Lucretia hates how the lie comes out easily.

“Would you mind telling me how it works?” Barry asks as he pulls his bag around to take out the gauntlet. Lucretia tries not to let her sharp inhale be heard. Of _course_ Barry will be the one to question this. “I’ve seen this gauntlet turn a colleague into a bloodthirsty inferno, burned another worse than my mother’s cooking, and leveled an entire town before you knew it. I’d like to know how you plan on destroying such a dangerous item.”

“The-” Something about Barry’s words make Lucretia lose her train of thought momentarily, was someone else with the three? “the Bureau of Balance has a singular purpose, and that is to collect and destroy certain, uh... let’s call them weapons of mass destruction. I guess you could call us a sort of disarmament organization, who is tasked with making the world safer by destroying the things that threaten it, namely powerful artifacts like the gauntlet that you have in your possession right now.”

“Gotcha.” Merle says.

Barry lets out a hum. “Sounds good to me.”

“Yeah, seems pretty solid.” Magnus adds.

One of the guards that was positioned next to Lucretia’s throne walks off behind the throne and towards the chamber for the relics, and comes out a few minutes later, rolling the cart with the heavy metal sphere with a circular window on it. “Plop that bad boy right in there.” The guard remarks.

Magnus snickers at the guard’s accent as Barry tosses the gauntlet into the metal sphere. The guard shuts the sphere and wheels it off to where they would, well, as far as the three knew, destroy Lup’s relic. “Before we destroy the relic, I must ask if there were any other adventurers with you, someone that may have been in Phandalin when it was destroyed that wasn’t a citizen of the town.”

“Why?” Barry asks.

“The… cleanup we’ll have to do will be easier with the more we know about the situation.” Lucretia answers, which wasn’t an entire lie.

“We had an elven companion, uh,” Merle rolls on his feet a bit as he searches for the name. “Tameco?”

“Taako.” Magnus corrects.

Lucretia’s heart, after hitting what she believed to be rock bottom, has brought a shovel and started digging.

Magnus continues, Lucretia apparently disguising the grief she was just hit with well enough to not draw attention. “He took the job with Merle and I, delivering this dude Gundren’s stuff to Phandalin. I thought he was just a stupid and vain elf, but when Gundren was about to just murder Barry in one fell swoop, Taako pushed him out of the way and took the blast.”

“Heroes can arise from any type of people.” Lucretia musters out in the strongest voice she can manage. She couldn’t break now. Just ten more minutes and then she could be alone, but for right now, she couldn’t break down.

_Oh Taako,_ Lucretia laments in her thoughts, _I’m so sorry. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. This wasn't how the story was supposed to go._


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spite made me update.

Taako’s reaction was something that alive Taako would have never been able to explain. Dead Taako? Taako that spent a century living with Barry, and remembers blasting Barry off the deck of the Starblaster to kill him? He knows why he did it, it was just an instinct to push Barry out of the way from the wall of fire that shot out from Gundren. That being said, he probably wouldn’t have done that again if he had the chance and his memories, Barry would be just fine undead.

Taako, however, was not going to be fine. He was very much dead, and when his spirit emerged from his body, which was now just… _gone,_ burned up in the fiery inferno of Gundren Rockseeker, along with all his stuff and Lup’s-

“Taako!” Taako whips his head around to see Lup, floating behind him and her lich form. Taako gasps, which is rather unnecessary, considering he can’t breathe anymore.

“Lup!” Taako exclaims, rushing over to Lup. His hug attempt doesn’t go through her, as they’re both incorporeal, but if anything that makes it more awkward, as he’s just hugging a skeleton in a robe. “Have you lost weight?” Taako jokes through a choked up voice.

“I guess you can say that.” Lup says with a laugh.

“Where were you?” Taako asks as more souls emerge from the black glass. “Why were you in that cave? And like, what the fuck?”

“Uh,” Lup looks up. “I’m going to have to tell you later.” Taako looks up to see a large portal opening up above the glassy remains of Phandalin, leading into the ethereal plane. Some former residents of Phandalin willingly float up into the portal, while others attempt to fight its pull, the same one that Taako is feeling on his soul right now. Lup, being a lich that is tied to the material plane with magic, wouldn’t be pulled into the portal, but Taako? He didn’t have much of chance.

Lup grabs Taako’s wrists, her skeletal fingers giving off an abnormal warmth, but Taako doesn’t do the same. He’s busy watching the scene unfold; souls all around them are being sucked up into the ethereal plane, pale spirits swirling around to make a sight that would, quite honestly, be a sight to behold if Taako wasn’t struggling to stay on the ground. Taako looks up at the ever expanding portal, and makes a decision he hopes he won’t end up regretting.

“You gotta let me go, Lu.”

“What?” Lup asks, startled.

“There’s something fucked up happening.” Taako explains as quickly as he can. “The last time I saw Barry, I killed him.”

“What!?” Lup repeats, this time with more shock.

“We were looking for you, and we just started to forget you and Barry told me to kill him and I blasted him off the deck of the Starblaster. I forgot him, I forgot you, I forgot everything. I don’t know why I did, but I think Lucretia had something to do with it. You gotta figure out what happened, and we can’t have the necromancy police on us because they got a rogue soul out.”

“You, you can’t _die,_ Taako. This is the last cycle.” Lup pleaded.

“What, you’re going to let death stop us?” Taako grins. “Thought a lich didn’t let death stop them.”

“Taako, what do you expect me to do?”

“You’re the necromancer! I can’t think of everything!” Taako exclaimed with a smile in his voice. Lup brings Taako into another somewhat awkward hug. “Be safe, Lu.” Taako says in a softer voice. “I’ll see you soon.”

“You too.”

And the two let go of each other.

**Author's Note:**

> LIFEHACK: Leaving a kudos, as well as commenting down below will help me find motivation to write more, and to get through a writer's block when I come across one. The longer and more thought out the comment, the better. Subscribe to stay up to date on new chapters, bookmark it maybe if you want to, share it with friends, go crazy!
> 
> And have a good day. Get up and stretch if you haven't in a while. Go drink a glass of water. You deserve it, pal.


End file.
